Last Updated on May 7, 2023 by Lisa Vargas
As preppers, we are always trying to gather and store things for the day when the SHTF. Many people have plenty of food on hand because it seems to be a lot easier to grasp that concept when you can conveniently buy emergency survival food kits that are freeze-dried and have a 20-year shelf life.
But how do you store water long term? What is the proper way to do this? Should you treat your stored water barrels with any chemicals or do you simply close the cap and keep your 55-gallon drum in the dark and hope it’s ok when you and your family need it?
Today we are going to look at all of those questions and I’m going to give you the break down on how you should be setting up your camp long term water supply. So let’s get started……
How Do You Store safe drinking water?
Below are the details of how to store water safely long term. You will find all of the information and items you need to be able to do this safely and effectively.
Step 1: Choose The best Long-term Water Storage Container
Having the best long-term water storage containers are the first thing you will need to do when planning water storage. You can buy long term water storage containers in a variety of sizes easily online. Some of the most popular sizes are as follows:
- 5-gallon water storage containers (as shown in the above picture)
- 30-gallon water storage containers
- 55-gallon water storage containers (as shown in the above picture)
What size you choose will depend on a variety of factors, but for now, I have listed some of the most popular sizes in the above list.
You might have seen other sizes of water containers that fall in between that such as the 7-gallon water container, a 15-gallon water container, a 50-gallon water container, and even something called a water BOB that fits 100-gallons in your bathtub.
These are all great, but for today’s purpose, we are going to focus on 5-gallon and 55-gallon water storage containers because these are the most popular and a lot of people are curious about storing water for these particular sizes.
If you live in an apartment, 55-gallon water storage containers aren’t going to work, so you will be storing water using the 5-gallon or 7-gallon water containers more than likely.
If you’re like me and have a house with a garage, then you can use the 55-gallon containers and store them there if you’re in a cool enough climate area.
You will also notice there are some water storage containers that have convenient spigots at the bottom of the barrel so you can easily get the water out to drink it. They tend to be a little more expensive, but they don’t require you to buy an extra pump.
There are also others that simply have an open nozzle at the top (called a bunghole) to stick a water hose into then you screw on the top. Have you ever thought of how you are going to get the water out of that type of water barrel when you need it?
You will need a heavy-duty drum pump/siphon that easily attaches to the top of this specific type of water barrel. It’s a hand pump that you can easily use to pump water from the storage barrel. We will talk more about that below.
Here is a closer look at the siphon. You simply need to place it inside the top hole then screw on the siphon.
You will notice that there are two holes on the 55-gallon water barrel. The siphon will fit on the smaller of the two holes.
Step 2: Clean Your Water Storage Containers
Make sure to clean your new water storage container before you put any water in it, even if it is brand new. You want to get rid of any possible contaminants beforehand.
Typically you can do this easily by adding a little household chlorine bleach, about a quarter of the way up with water, and a cup and a half of bleach and roll them around the yard a bit to clean them out. Then rinse them again on the inside with water.
Another way you can do this is to boil some tap water and pour it into your smaller water storage containers. Vigorously shake the smaller 5-gallon containers to get the water in all corners of the container, then drain.
You can also add some common dish soap like Dawn to the inside of your water storage containers. Then roll your 55-gallon barrels around then rinse out. Get creative. Get it done. It’s a little bit of a pain, but you must make 100% your containers, no matter how big or small, are cleaned properly.
Step 3: Filling Your Water Storage Container
I know this might seem obvious, but there’s a little caveat to this. It is recommended that instead of using a garden hose, you can buy a specialty drinking water hose. I didn’t know there was a difference before I started doing my own water storage, so you will feel much better knowing you have all of your basis covered.
These hoses are NSF certified drinking water safe and are made with an FDA compliant hose liner material.
Step 4: Long Term Water Storage Additive
Once you get the water inside of the barrel you are going to want to buy a bottle of water preserver concentrate. This is water preserver concentrate kills and prevents the re-growth of Coliform bacteria and other disease-causing microorganisms for 5 years when used as directed.
Water Preserver kills the pathogenic organisms responsible for typhoid, dysentery and other serious diseases, and also kills and prevents the growth of yeast, mold, fungi, and algae which also make water undrinkable.
With that said, there are some websites that will tell you that it is absolutely necessary to treat your water with a preserver or chlorine. This isn’t necessarily the case if you are using water out of your hose. The water out of your tap has already been treated so there’s no need to treat it again.
But just in case you are getting water from another source, I would recommend treating water with chlorine or the water preservation concentration.
When treating water, you can do this easily by adding a little household chlorine bleach, about 4-5 drops (about 1 teaspoon) of unscented chlorine bleach for every 5 gallons of water you are storing.
Step 5: How To Properly Seal Long Term Water Storage Containers
Making sure you have sealed your stored water is vital to the entire process. The biggest thing to remember here is to tighten the hole at the top (if you are using a 55-gallon barrel) as tight as possible to prevent contamination.
You can use a bung wrench to do that. It’s the easiest and surest way to get the tightest seal on your water. The bung wrench is specially made to fit 55-gallon drums and a few other sizes. You can also use a pair of needle-nosed pliers if you don’t want to get a bung wrench.
The same concept applies to the smaller 5-7 gallon water storage containers as well.
Step 6: Store Your Water In A Cool, Dark Place
Once you’ve filled your 55-gallon drums with the water, you will need to place them in a cool, dark place. Now, you might be thinking….”wait a minute. I just filled up this water and it’s super heavy now and I can’t move it!”
You can also see to the left the storage format for stacking barrels. It’s a great idea if you want to get crafty with building a 3-tier 55-gallon stacking system to store your barrels. You can also throw a black tarp over this for extra protection against sunlight.
This is a great point, and it’s important to think of this ahead of time before you fill up your water barrel. If you live out on a ranch, you might have a tractor that you can use to move the barrel to its proper storing place.
But if you live in an urban environment, and you plan on storing your water in your garage, you are going to either already have your 55-barrels in their proper place, or you can use a heavy-duty hand-cart that can handle the heavyweight, or even you can use one of these plastic drum dollies made for 55-gallon barrels.
It’s also a good idea to keep the barrels off of the ground just so that there is no chance of contamination if something in your storage area leaks such as gasoline or oils. You can do this simply by getting some bricks and placing your barrels on top of them.
Here’s another good idea if you wanted to do it. You can add an extra layer of black tarp to go over the water barrels just to add an extra layer of protection. Or, try these awesome black cloth covers made specifically to protect your 55-gallon water storage barrels.
Remember that one of the biggest dangers to your water storage is light. If light gets into your barrels, it can encourage algae growth. Covering your barrels also helps hide my water storage barrels from nosey neighbors!
Now if all of this sounds too confusing, you can get a 30-gallon water storage kit or a 55-gallon water storage kit and then you don’t have to worry about forgetting anything.
Step 7: Time-Stamp Your Water Storage Containers
Make sure before you cover your water storage barrels to write descriptive information on each of your long-term water storage containers. This way you will know when it’s the right time to rotate the water. It is commonly stated that you should rotate your water to keep it fresh once every year.
On top of that, you should be opening your water storage containers and double-checking them every 6 months to make sure they aren’t contaminated with anything.
How Long Will Water Last?
By now you are probably wondering how long your water is going to last in these long term water storage barrels. This question about water storage and many others can be addressed in a previous article I did about some of the common questions when storing water long-term.
The reality is that you are going to need to rotate your water every year. Properly stored water can last for years, but to keep it fresh it’s recommended that you rotate the water every year.
So you can essentially say that it’s safe to keep your water stored for one year before you have to switch it out with new freshwater. But don’t forget, there will be other uses for water in a post-apocalypse world. Don’t forget things like brushing your teeth, washing your clothes, watering survival gardens, cleaning dishes, and taking “showers”.
Water will be necessary far beyond just drinking it. So you can essentially store water for years, but use the water you haven’t rotated for other tasks such as described above.
Final Thoughts
No matter what size water storage container you use, you will need to make sure that the containers are made of food-grade polyethylene (does not include BPA). Make sure you have enough water stored for you and your family.
Typically you can be safe by planning for one gallon, per person, per day. You can even use this cool hydration calculator to help with determining how much water you should get each day.
Important Note: Please remember that you will need to rotate this water out every year to keep it fresh. Think ahead of time. How will you get the water out of the barrels? You won’t be able to move it unless you opted to buy the plastic drum dollies that I mentioned above. You will have to more than likely siphon it out onto your garage floor, or into 5-gallon buckets and carry it out.